We often consider surgery to chest as a major procedure. However, we have made considerable progress over the last few years with better (single keyhole surgery) techniques, superior pain management and digital (second to second) monitoring of air leak from surgery.

Now, many patients undergoing thoracic surgery have good pain control and do not require a chest drain, facilitating day case surgery.

Patients undergoing pleural effusion surgery, pleural biopsies, mediastinal surgery, pneumothorax surgery and lung biopsies have the option of having surgery as a day case procedure.

The programme has been developed with a team at the Harley Street Clinic in London. Once you have decided that you want to have a day case procedure, you will be seen by a nurse for pre-admission where you will have the necessary investigations. You come in on the morning of the procedure and if all is fine (you recovered well from the anaesthetic, your pain is under control, you don't have a drain) you will be allowed to go home on the day of surgery itself.

I was so happy to be the first lung surgery day patient - I could skipped all the way home! If Mr Lim can get that result from a 55 year old, with the number of operations that I have had and all the bits that are missing from my insides - who knows what he can achieve next?! Soon there could be clinics popping up in all the major cities where people can pop in and have lunchtime lung surgery and back to work!

— Caroline Van Oss, 2016

Do feel free to contact me if you would like to know more about this procedure or to discuss you suitability for a day case operation.